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Irish hotel prices drop 21% year-on-year- steepest faller in Western Europe: The average price of a hotel room in Ireland dropped 21% year-on-year, according to the latest Hotels.com Hotel Price Index (HPI).
The average price paid for a hotel room in Ireland in the 12 months from January to December 2009 was €80, compared with €101 paid in the previous 12 months in 2008. This price drop of 21% in Ireland is the steepest fall in hotel prices experienced by any Western European country for this period. Ireland is followed by Norway as the next biggest faller in Western Europe with a drop of 20% year-on-year to €113. Overall, European prices were down 13% on average with every European country experiencing a drop in hotel room prices.
The average price of €80 paid for a hotel room in Ireland makes us the least expensive Western European nation and the fourth cheapest in Europe. The three Eastern European countries of the Czech Republic (€68 per night on average), Hungary (€70) and Poland (€70) recorded the lowest hotel room prices in 2009. Switzerland was Europe’s most expensive country with an average hotel room price of €135 in 2009.
The Hotels.com HPI tracks the real prices paid per hotel room rather than the advertised rates. It is based on prices actually paid by customers for 94,000 hotels across 16,000 locations around the world. The latest HPI looks at hotel prices for 2009 and compares to hotel room prices paid the year previous.
Dublin hotel room prices dropped a dramatic 23% year-on-year from €98 to €76, making the Irish capital one of the least expensive major cities in the world.
Hotels.com says Dublin is now remarkably good value to stay in and the most inexpensive major city in the whole of Western Europe, well behind the likes of Paris (€113), London (€112), Rome (€105), Amsterdam (€102) and Madrid (€87).
GM US car sales: Bloomberg reports that General Motors Co. posted a 12% rise in US sales in February, as snowstorms curbed showroom traffic across much of the country.
Deliveries rose to 141,951 from 127,296 a year earlier, Detroit-based GM said today. The biggest US car maker's comparison was from a very poor February 2009, as speculation on a bankruptcy stalled sales. Separately, GM said today it is voluntarily recalling 1.3 million compact cars, including the auto maker's popular Chevrolet Cobalt model, because the cars' power steering could fail.
The average price paid for a hotel room fell 14% worldwide in 2009, according to Hotels.com's latest hotel price index. David Roche, president of Hotels.com, told CNBC Tuesday that the index measures hotel prices around the globe in most major cities:
Apple: Apple has sued HTC, which makes several Google-based smart phones, saying the Taiwanese phone maker is infringing 20 patents related to its iPhone.
HTC has built up its brand in the recent years thanks to its early support of Google's Android operating system. It was the first company to sell an Android phone and more recently built Google's Nexus One phone, which the search engine giant is selling directly to consumers.
Nokia has filed patent infringement claims against Apple and Japanese company Fujitsu claims it is owner of the trademark "iPad," the name for Apple's new tablet computer.
It's all good business for lawyers.
US markets
In New York, the Dow has risen 45 points or 0.43% to 10,449.
The S&P 500 is up 0.60% and the Nasdaq has climbed 0.56%.
CNBC's Steve Liesman sits down with the man at the center of the Fed rate debate, Thomas Hoenig, president and CEO of the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City:
In Europe, the Dow Jones Stoxx 600 has risen 0.72% Tuesday.
In Dublin, the ISEQ has added 0.71%.
CRH is down 0.52% and AIB is up 1.60% after both reported 2009 results today:
On the New York Mercantile Exchange, oil for April 2010 delivery is trading at $80.04, up $1.34 from Monday's close. In London, Brent crude for April delivery is trading at $78.38 a barrel.
Currencies
The euro is trading at $1.3562 and at £0.9087.
For live currency updates, check the right-hand column of the Finfacts home page.The dollar traded at a record low $1.6038 per euro on July 15, 2008.
